An in-game conversation about tauntless Tankers

TL;DR: Players are free to choose their powers as they wish. However, a Tank without Taunt isn't utilizing all the available tools and will, therefore, be less effective at dedicated tanking than one who takes the power.

Been following this thread for a couple days. It got me thinking about my experiences with people on their Tanks (Never play 'em myself). I'm the self-reliant type so I don't really play squishies but I've seen the impact of a solid Tank versus a subpar one. Saying that any Tank without Taunt is inherently subpar may be a bit much but I'd definitely be willing to assert that those who do take and utilize Taunt are more capable of performing in the tank role.

Before anyone accuses me of trying to force other players into my idea of what the AT should be, I'm all for imagination and creativity. But let's just be honest, if Tanks weren't supposed to, at least some of the time, protect the team by controlling aggro they wouldn't be so well equipped to do so. Only they and, to a lesser extent Brutes and Scrappers, have the requisite abilities.

This is an MMO with a class system after all. The whole point of classes is to distinguish player characters from one another by the roles they perform best. That's not to say there isn't some overlap but disregarding the fact that some classes are, by design, better at certain tasks than others is kinda ridiculous.

Thats all I been getting at Ironblade. I would gladly team with a tauntless Tanker, gladly do it without criticizing, never seen a point where a Tanker is needed really cos I do it with other alts, Doms, Controllers, Blasters, Pbs you name it all have something on offer that can turn a nightmare around.

I was expecting you to say something like "I have a Inv/DM with Darkest Night and get by!" for some reason and it is a power really worth having but it just comes at 41 when ya might of had to deal with a number of AVs prior like that Countess Crey.

If I could see Quicksand, Darkest Night and Conserve Energy all in one epic then there would be no other epic worth taking. Concept makes me take Fire epic on one of my Firetanks rather than me looking to be most flexible like take Earth Mastery or Soul Mastery so I myself do not hold people down to anything unconceptual but I still make up for any build shortfalls and many team dynamic shortfalls with my use of taunt.

Anything can happen in Beta and be chucked in Beta to a point where whatever happened in Beta may not even count. I go by the website I first saw when I bought the game which described Blasters and the booklet I had which came with the game. It is well within a Blasters capability to not have melee damage, just look at Devices so, Ranged/Melee damage is not a good description at all.

I think if you are building a Tanker to tank... then Taunt is invaluable. Having said that, a Tanker is not just for tanking IMHO.

I made a tanker basically to just fight. She has got taunt, but, at the time war mace was not available to scrappers, otherwise she'd have been a Scrapper. Could have done her as a brute I guess... but I didn't have going Rogue, and I wanted her to be a hero.

If I am the only tanker on the team, I will make an effort to tank the mobs. If I am not, I play back up to the tanker that is taunting and drawing agro.

I think, overall, it comes down to what you intend to do with your character. I am a huge proponent of building my characters such that they are quite capable of handling any situation within reason.
In my opinion, a Tanker without taunt might as well have been rolled as a Brute or Scrapper. With all that IOs and Incarnates let someone do these days, someone who might have before made a Tanker to be a "heftier" Brute/Scrapper can now make a Brute/Scrapper that is just about as survivable as a Tanker. And, doing so would give you a character that can do more damage while not putting you in charge of a character who would be expected to actually Tank.

And, the thing is, Tankers are the only AT in the game that other players are going to expect to be able to Tank. Yes, Brutes can do so as well but when a Tanker is on the team there is an automatic expectation of them.
That same expectation is much more loosely associated with other ATs. Any Mastermind, Defender, Corrupter, or Controller can provide buffs, debuffs, and/or healing. When seeking people to do what they do, most people will quite comfortably interchange those 4 ATs.
Scrappers, Brutes, Blasters, Stalkers, Kheldians, VEATs, and Corrupters are looked at for doing the main damage. There, again, the expectation is for damage but any of them can work. Actually, most ATs can function in this role without much question.
But, Tankers are the ones looked to for the function of Tanker and they are not really sought for to fill other roles. Yes, a tanker can be outfitted for doing good damage. But, we tend not to expect other ATs to be automatically outfitted to Tank.

Is that expectation right or wrong? I suppose that depends on each person to decide.

So you are trying to sell Taunt on the basis that I've already lost aggro? Pfff.

Taunt is not the only ranged attack I have, and any ranged attack will grab back the aggro. A PBAoE will probably grab back the aggro and hold it better. However if I had been mixing enough damage with my own attacks the controller wouldn't have pulled away the aggro in the first place.

IMHO, the problem with the mindset of "both sides" to this conversation is a failure to place proper value on the entire "package of tools" given to a Tanker so that you can manage aggro.

Now, I play a very good Ice/Axe tanker. One could say that Ice Armor might have the advantage on aggro with 2 taunt auras in the primary and taunt from the secondary. I also run Tier 4 Nerve alpha which gives all qualifying powers a nice boost to taunt effects. You might say that my tank holds aggro very well and it is very difficult to steal that aggro.
Thanks to the way I've built, I can use my tools to literally force the AVs in the incarnate trials to completely ignore anyone else (including other tanks). They are so focused on me that they will literally try to run over everyone else to get to me. I've even seen that slow poke Siege *jump* over the crowd to get to me. Yeah, he can't move fast, but apparently he can jump. The downside is that sometimes all my defenses don't hold up to the task. But, that's what Hibernate is for!

I tell this story to make the case that no one character is defined by a single power. But, when you consider how well that power helps you operate in combination with all your other powers, you'd have to be foolish not to take that power because you would be depriving yourself that which would make the combo. And, that isn't to say that just because you have Taunt you know how to manage aggro. But, it certainly does help make that task much easier.

So, all that said, it comes down to a question of whether or not you can cover all the bases with/without Taunt. In my opinion, neither Gauntlet nor Taunt are enough alone. You need to have both working together to achieve greater results than either can do alone.